What Is Texture Rubbing?
Texture rubbing is one of the coolest art techniques you can try! Here is how it works: you place a piece of paper over a textured object, then rub a crayon sideways across the paper. Like magic, the texture appears on your paper!
This works because the crayon only touches the raised parts of the texture, leaving the lower parts white. The result is a beautiful copy of the texture transferred onto your paper.
You can make texture rubbings of so many things: leaves (the veins show up beautifully!), coins (you can see all the tiny details!), tree bark, fabric with a woven pattern, bumpy walls, manhole covers, and even the bottom of your shoes!
Texture rubbing has been used by artists for hundreds of years. The famous artist Max Ernst created entire artworks using texture rubbings, a technique he called frottage (a French word meaning rubbing).